Anti-Piracy Firm Offering ISPs Money For Outing File-Sharers

mytrip points out news that an anti-piracy firm called Nexicon has been offering financial incentives to ISPs in exchange for having the ISPs police their own networks for copyright infringement. Nexicon would offer their services (for a fee) to help the ISPs pinpoint users who are illegally sharing files, and then give the users an option to "settle" through their "Get Amnesty" website. The revenue generated by such settlements would then be shared with the ISPs. Jerry Scroggin, owner of a smaller ISP in Louisiana, is still skeptical, saying, "I would still wind up losing customers. I would also have to pay Nexicon for this ... I have to survive in this economy but I don't have the big marketing dollars that bigger ISPs have. I have to fund 401(K)s and find ways not to lay off people. Giving free rein to the RIAA is not part of my business model."

Comments

they pitch an interesting plan

[v1]

"I would still wind up losing customers. I would also have to pay Nexicon for this ...

They do address this on their web page

THE VALUE: GetAmnesty provides content owners with a new revenue stream by collecting settlement fees on their behalf from those who illegally download their copyrighted content. Further, violators are tagged with a complete history of their downloading activities, which is easily translated to create customer profiles for online marketing purposes.

Looks like they intend for the loss of customers to be more than offset by the extortion payments you receive from some of them.

I'm betting NOT. Suing (or extorting, threatening to sue and selling "protection") your customers has never been an effective business model. You'd think they'd have learned that by now.

Re:they pitch an interesting plan

[Kindaian]

And as they are at that, what differentiates a legal from an illegal download?

Specially as they don't know if I've or not a license to the download or not!

Re:they pitch an interesting plan

[Schickeneder]

That would only work if all the ISPs gave in. In most cities it's easy enough to switch internet service providers, if one gives in to the dark side, simply abandon ship and move on to the next. With Gustav hitting Louisiana recently many customers switched phone and internet providers simply because the others were taking too long to restore services after the outage (even though in most cases it wasn't entirely their fault). I even saw a telecom representative going door to door conducting polls and offering incentives to try and retain some of the customer base. This business model would only work IF the lawsuits consistently paid out, which they don't seem to do. Many of them drag on for years, meanwhile the ISP is left to wait, hoping on some sort of returns, all the while knowing they "betrayed" their customers.

Re:they pitch an interesting plan

[Penguinisto]

So the ISP can wait for a small piece of the eventual "settlement fees" and go without money in the interim, or instead continue making regular money right now from a continuing customer...

Did the RIAA really think this through?

/P

Re:they pitch an interesting plan

[owlnation]

True, but the average customer might never know or figure out that it was the ISP that sold them out.

The ISP does have a duty to protect the privacy of a customer, I think most people know that it's hard to identify anyone without the ISP coughing up data -- legally or otherwise. Anyway, I don't think that matters. My guess is that the first act of anyone who is accused of file sharing, is to change their ISP, regardless of who found out about them, or sold them out. It only makes sense to do so. Either way, the ISP loses. And rightly so, they should not be giving up data without a solid court warrant to anyone, for any reason.

Re:they pitch an interesting plan

[cdrguru]

I think if they see a BitTorrent connection and the content is music or a movie it is pretty much a given that you don't have a license. Maybe you do, so you have a defense. But I'd say it is very much like being caught by the police with a crowbar and a TV after a store was broken into. Sure, you might be completely innocent and you will have plenty of opportunity to prove it. After they arrest you.

Re:they pitch an interesting plan

[Holi]

I would but they are all in jail.
I mean honestly, organized crime is a much smaller player then it ever used to be. Its hard to compete with the government sanctioned criminals.

More than losing customers

[davmoo]

Besides losing customers, if ISPs start policing their networks like that, don't they then give up some of their "safe haven" protections and all that?

That pill is poison.

[Anonymous Coward]

Once the ISP's start accepting this money, good bye safe harbor provision. You can't claim to be a common carrier once you've accepted responsibility for policing your content.

Now it's easy--someone with one of your ISP's IP addresses downloaded my copyrighted content? I don't even need to know who they are--I sue the ISP and win.

The potential legal liability an ISP would be signing up for to participate in this is MASSIVE. You're now potential liable for every copyrighted piece of data on your network.

Re:That pill is poison.

[cdrguru]

I don't think you understand how ISPs have DMCA Safe Harbor. They have it because they are required to cooperate with enforcement. If they fail to cooperate, they lose. So assisting in enforcement doesn't hurt them.

Now it is indeed a good question how much cooperation is actually required under the provisions of the DMCA. Clearly, turning over customer information is required, which all ISPs do when properly served. But do they have to go the extra mile as this program does? If I was marketing this program I would certainly spin it that they can cooperate or they can face losing their Safe Harbor status and suddenly become a party to infringement actions brought on their customers.

The idea that the ISP can shield cusomters from legal action has never existed. Any suggetion that the ISP can afford not to cooperate is going to go out the window pretty soon, should this actually work out.

Re:That pill is poison.

[JoshHeitzman]

And you clearly don't understand it. What your talking about here is not enforcement, it is investigation. The only enforcement they are required to cooperate with by the DMCA are take down notices. "Any suggetion that the ISP can afford not to cooperate is going to go out the window pretty soon, should this actually work out." this sounds like something the RIAA wants folks to believe.

Ahh, I see

[Xelios]

So the RIAA/MPAA's strategy in stopping the lawsuits was simply to outsource that operation to a 3rd party in an attempt to distance themselves from the negative publicity they've been getting. Should anything go wrong, this company will just be cut loose and left to deal with whatever mess they've gotten themselves into, and the cycle will start again with a new company.

Morals or Pocketbook

[nurb432]

Sounds to me like that ISP in the story has no moral grounding and would screw its customers if the economy didnt suck.

The war is just beginning people. Are you ready?

Re:great business model there jim

[damburger]

Welcome to the world of 'Intellectual Property'. The owners of huge amounts of IP demand they be given lots of money on the premise that this will ultimately (through some only vaguely specified mechanism) result in artists being rewarded for the quality of their work.

Re:Huh, madness

[cdrguru]

An ISP log isn't going to be the final answer. Someone, somewhere is going to be looking at computer hard drives, CDs, DVDd, etc. If they do not find any infringing materials there is no evidence and the matter drops.

Now I would imagine if the ISP faked up some logs to provide material for the examination of cmoputers and a lot of it turned out to be bogus you would have the ISP getting sued by both ends of this. Because examining the computers (by a qualified forensic examiner) isn't cheap and because losing your computer for a couple of weeks isn't much fun either. So I would say there are substantial risks to faking logs and the end result is that it doesn't go anywhere. No settlements. Because there is no legal action and no possibility of legal action.

Now if someone wants to go from logs to making a settlement offer to the potential offender, that is just stupid. Because you just tipped your hand and the potential offender then can delete everything from their computer, without penalty, because there is no requirement to preserve evidence. So bypassing the "seize the computer" step nets you nothing in the long run.

Re:Huh, madness

[Jah-Wren Ryel]

Now if someone wants to go from logs to making a settlement offer to the potential offender, that is just stupid.

That is pretty much how ever RIAA case has ever gone.